All’s fair in love, war and, apparently, recruiting

Just had an interesting conversation with a family member of UTSA commit Ryan Polite that sheds a bit more light on the budding rivalry between the UTSA and Texas State regimes.

In their quest for supremacy, the two adversaries are going to end up battling for many of the same recruits, which will serve as an intriguing sub-plot as the rivalry develops. Indeed, even though the two won’t play each other until 2012, it’s already happening.

In addition to luring away Round Rock Westwood lineman Zach Crawford earlier this week, the Bobcats apparently made a strong play for Polite. And they did their homework, too.

Polite’s been rock solid ever since UTSA stepped up with an offer in December, maintaining his commitment even as Texas State, Minnesota and Purdue came through DeSoto to gauge his resolve.

But Texas State did more than just test the waters, apparently dangling the possibility of making Polite’s good friend, un-committed receiver Sam Ajala, an offer if Ryan switched. When I spoke to Ryan in December, he said such a gambit would be the only reason he’d ever consider switching allegiance.

It didn’t work, but you have to admire the audacity.

“How did they know that?” wondered Polite’s family member, who I’m going to keep anonymous as we were only speaking casually. “He’s definitely a Roadrunner. But (Texas State) is really working it.”

The two schools already have every reason to dislike each other, and instances like this will only fuel the fire.

Though there are really no rules when it comes to recruiting, there’s a sort of gentleman’s agreement that teams are supposed to back off when a player has committed. Of course, that rarely happens if the player is good enough, or the need is great enough. But it’s still part of the unwritten code, and you can bet the Roadrunners are steamed (to put it mildly).

Did Texas State want Polite for his own merits, or to sabotage UTSA? Probably a bit of both, but the Bobcats wouldn’t appear to be in desperate need of a quarterback after the promising freshman season of Tyler Arndt.

Regardless, I’d be extremely interested to know how many other UTSA commits Texas State has tried to pry loose, which will be a pet project over the next couple of weeks. I’m even more interested to see how this unfolds over the coming years, when the Franchione regime isn’t scrambling to get its feet under it.

Dan McCarney

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[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by nTm, Jim Bob Breazeale. Jim Bob Breazeale said: Let me say, I love having UTSA as a rival WAY MORE than I did Sam Houston. This is gonna be fun. http://bit.ly/hMA7fh [...]